


The Makings of a Monster

by deathlessdeathwish



Category: Turn (TV 2014)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-07
Updated: 2017-07-18
Packaged: 2018-11-29 00:42:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 5,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11429601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathlessdeathwish/pseuds/deathlessdeathwish
Summary: A character study of John Graves Simcoe, exploring key events of his childhood that helped to mold him into the merciless malefactor he would become.





	1. Chapter 1

His mother always told him that he was not the first. 

At three years old, he was a solemn, precocious child. Instead of sitting on her lap, he stood somewhat awkwardly, clutching the soft fabric of her homespun wool dress. She sat in his father's wooden chair, the only furnishing in the room besides the footstool. She did not offer to let him sit in her lap, and John did not ask. Day after day, for weeks on end, she told him of the others, The Ones Who Came Before.

The first had been little Paul, born sometime in June, 1745. Attended by an English midwife, his mother had been exhausted but exhilarated when the red-faced, squalling babe was placed in her arms. Her own mother had delivered 10 children, of whom only she and her elder brother Edward survived to adulthood. At 20 years old – an age which was considered by some to already be an old maid – Katherine Simcoe, nee Graves, had finally achieved the greatest goal a woman could hope for: marriage and motherhood, and both in the same year.

Her husband, John, worked as a physician at Fort William. He worked long hours, and they seldom saw each other. Little Paul would prove to be a great source of comfort to Katherine in the empty hours that marked her husband’s absence.

In December, just as his first few teeth were growing, Paul suddenly stopped eating. He neither slept nor moved, but simply stared at the ceiling. Patches of bright red welts broke out on the skin of his arms, face, and neck. Before the New Year, Paul was dead, buried in the graveyard of the local chapel frequented by the English soldiers and workers of the East India Company.

Katherine had wanted to bury Paul dressed in the white silk gown he had worn for his baptism. When John explained to her – in his kind and gentle way – that the gown was a Simcoe family heirloom, worn by his own father and his grandfather, Katherine had relented and allowed Paul be buried in the drab, plain cotton gown he wore to sleep. The depth of Katherine’s despair was mitigated when, not quite a month after Paul’s death, she learned that she was with child once more. The second, christened William James Simcoe, was born in September of 1746. Unlike his predecessor, William was a quiet, lethargic baby. He never seemed to thrive, and by February he too was interred in the chapel’s graveyard, buried in the plot beside Paul.

Katherine’s grief in response to William’s death was decidedly more muted. She withdrew from all social gatherings, having nothing to do with anyone. The wives of the English settlers in the city, having little else to do, gossiped ceaselessly about her. She was a snob, they decided, this pitiful young upstart from Devonshire. She was not even truly English, they opined, since she was descended from the wild Celtic pagans of Cornwall, and wed to a man of similar extraction.

Willingly excluded from polite society, Katherine languished for years in the small, sparse bungalow that she and her husband had settled in upon relocating to Calcutta early in their marriage. She passed the time in needlework, cleaning, and reading the Bible – the only book she had ever thought worthy of reading. Perhaps, she thought, the English wives were correct in one aspect. Perhaps the premature deaths of her sons were God’s way of punishing her for her past indifference. Perhaps she was being punished for the savage barbarism of her pagan ancestors. 

Whatever the cause, Katherine found herself wholly converted. She renounced the apostasy of the Muhammadan and Hindu Bengali people. She prayed chronically for their salvation. It was only by the continued expansion of the Company into India that would save the souls of the infidels. They could not but benefit from the dual blessings of conversion to the true God of Christianity and subjection to the United Kingdom, the greatest nation in the world.

When her third child was conceived in the spring of 1751, Katherine prayed fervently that God would protect her child. _Lord, let him be a beacon to the world, she prayed. Let him flourish and be an instrument of Thy mercy and peace throughout the world._

John Graves Simcoe was born on February 25, 1752. In contrast to her previous experiences, the labor process was mercifully brief. Within a few hours of her beginning pains, Katherine was delivered of a healthy son. Born with a thatch of reddish brown hair and luminescent blue eyes, he bore a striking resemblance to her father. As she cradled the flailing, bellowing baby in her arms, Katherine thanked God for answering her prayers.

John had not been the first, but neither was he the last. On the last day of his third year, after recounting to him the history of her many sorrows and newfound joy at his birth, Katherine revealed to him that soon he would have a baby brother or sister.


	2. Chapter 2

John greeted the news of his impending sibling with relative indifference. He knew that he was the apple of his mother’s eye, the center of her universe. Nothing could change that.

The man he called _Father_ \- reluctantly, and only at Katherine’s bidding - was inscrutable, brusque and taciturn to the point of discourtesy. He spent the majority of his days attending to the needs of the poor natives, returning to the bungalow to eat the evening meal and retire to bed.

The child resented his father, but his mother adored him. Besotted, she trailed after him when he was home, hovering. She spent hours every day cleaning the bungalow, top to bottom. Every day, she invariably cooked an Indian dish as the main course of their meals. Little John hated the spiciness of curry, the strange aroma and texture of basmati rice. By the age of four, he was as small and stunted as a two-year-old.

He wasted away, and his father neither noticed nor seemed to care. Desperate, Katherine fed him banana slices mixed with milk. She stopped waiting on her husband, devoting all of her time and attention to little John. John Senior accepted the shift in his wife’s priorities readily, sleeping in a barracks at the Fort.

He had stayed in the barracks for about a month when rumors of an uprising began. The _Nawab_ of Bengal - the equivalent of a prince or chieftain - had long voiced his opposition to the presence of the British in his country, and he was beginning to openly defy the East India Company.

It seemed only natural that one would resent occupation by an entity outside of one’s own tribe, especially when said entity imposed its own values on the tribe and demanded absolute compliance. But God Almighty had foreordained the occupation of Bengal, and if the British were to leave - well, then that would be His decision as well.

The _Nawab_ had reportedly petitioned the British to cease fortification of Fort William, but that was scarce indication of divine directive. Throughout the uncertainty of her son’s illness and separation from her husband, Katherine prayed with renewed ardor.

_Dear Lord, please be with my husband and son in this perilous time. Strengthen little John, Lord, if it be Thy will; please also protect my husband, and all those stationed at Fort William. Regardless, let everything come to pass according to Thy will. Amen._

As spring bled into summer, the soil of Fort William became suffused with British blood.


	3. Chapter 3

These are the dimensions of the holding cell at Fort William: 4.3 meters x 5.5 meters (14 feet x 18 feet). It is a room large enough to hold three grown men, perhaps four. John Simcoe, Sr. is one of several dozen Englishmen currently crammed in the unconscionably cramped space. 

They have been herded together and imprisoned like cattle in a slaughterhouse, like sardines in a tin can. Thomas Crutchfield, the pleasant young man from Somerset, has long been silent. John thinks that perhaps he has died. He is ambivalent; on one hand, death is a respite, in these circumstances. On the other hand, he feels sorrow for the wife and daughter that the young captain has left behind.

John thinks of his own wife and son, the child within her that he will never know. It will be a boy too, he thinks, a strong, healthy boy to further the Simcoe line. It will make up for the losses of his first- and second-born sons, and will provide Katherine some solace when he is gone. John has no illusions. He is going to die in this room, hearing the moans and cries of his compatriots, covered in their communal piss and shit and vomit.

He thinks, too, of little John. He has wronged the boy, treated him with the cold disinterest that he would a lapdog, a silly trifle to amuse Katherine whilst he pursued his own interests. He has heard the murmurs at assemblies, at the pub and even at the chapel. _Simcoe has gone native,_ they say. _He prefers slumming with Bengali heathens to the company of his own family!_

They were right, he realizes now. He cannot say why. Perhaps he simply never had the inclination to be the dutiful husband and father that others expected him to be. Beyond wedding and bedding Katherine, John never got any sense of fulfillment or purpose in domestic life. It is only out on the streets of Calcutta, ministering to the needs of the sick and destitute, that he feels any sort of meaning.

Katherine and little John have never wanted for anything in a material sense. But, he now understands, they have been sorely deprived of other, even more vital factors: the love and protection of a dependable husband and father. Is it any wonder, then, that Katherine smothers the boy so? He never paid him the least bit of attention, leaving his heir to be spoiled and coddled to his detriment.

His last thoughts before he succumbs are to wonder what sort of man his son will become.


	4. Chapter 4

When Katherine receives word of her husband’s death, she is desolate. In spite of her hours of prayerful petition, her stoic resolve to accept God’s will no matter the outcome, she had been certain he would be saved. Now, of more than 60 soldiers packed into the brig at the Fort, only about 20 have survived.

 _Thy will be done on earth, as it is in Heaven…_ The words repeat incessantly in Katherine’s mind, even as she wails and weeps wildly in the bungalow. She picks up the footstool and throws it, smashing it against the wall in her furor. Seated in his father’s chair, little John looks up when he hears the crash. His mother’s black leather Bible in hand, he has been intently studying the illustrations of hellfire, of unrepentant sinners burning eternally.

_What is wrong, Mother? Has something happened?_

Katherine blinks, looks pitifully at her son. He blinks in turn, his eyes bright, brow furrowing in consternation. He is her own sweet, darling boy, all that she has left of her husband. Picking him up, she cradles little John in her arms, sitting on the floor against the wall. Her Bible falls to the floor, forgotten.

Little John’s expression remains impassive as Katherine tells him - in a quaking voice, her body wracked by sobs - that his father is dead, _along with at least 40 other Englishmen._ Siraj, the _Nawab_ , has riled the natives against their rightful overseers. They are all pawns in Satan’s grip, these Muhammadans. _You see what happens, John, when a person tries to show mercy to their inferiors? None is extended to them in turn, in their hour of need. Christ Himself once said that the merciful are blessed, for they will be shown mercy, but the Bible also instructs us to take an eye for an eye…_

She mumbles on for an hour or more, at times incoherent. Little John holds her hand, and sometimes dozes off in her embrace. She does not seem to notice. Finally, when he can no longer sit still, he begins to cry. Katherine flinches, stunned, as her child quivers in her hold. 

She kisses his forehead, straightens a stray lock of his hair. _I am sorry, John,_ she laments, loosening her embrace slightly. _I am so sorry we have lost him. We have only each other, now_. The child squirms in her grip, gently disentangling from her. He brushes the tears from his eyes, wipes them roughly on the cotton sleeping gown he has not changed out of.

 _Mummy,_ he says gently, hesitantly. _I am not crying because your husband is dead. I am hungry, and hoping you can make us something to eat._


	5. Chapter 5

In the weeks following his father’s death, little John Graves Simcoe flourished. He ate meat, bread, cheese. He drank milk, tea or small ale with every meal. When Katherine told him that the _Nawab_ had been executed, he felt a sense of vindication. His father had spent his life in service to the natives, had shown them the utmost mercy and kindness, only to be subjected to a slow, merciless death like an animal.

He had been **weak.** Mercy was weakness.

In the waning days of her pregnancy, when she was confined to her bed, Katherine read to little John from her Bible, tales he has heard at times in the chapel. His favorite tale is of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah; he imagines a similar destruction of Calcutta, a mass annihilation of the Bengali.

India will be at peace only when it willingly submits to Company rule. The British Empire is the greatest in the history of the world, second only to the imminent Kingdom of Heaven, which will be established when Christ returns to bring peace to the earth. The East India Company rules by proxy for George II, the divinely ordained King of Great Britain.

When Percy Graves Simcoe was born in September 1756, Katherine made the decision to leave India.  


Because he had spent his whole life in the hot, humid climes of West Bengal, John would not be able to tolerate the milder, wetter climate of England. Katherine, whose parents had immediately offered to open their home to them, wept as she wrote them a stilted, polite response. She thanked them most heartily for their offer, but she must decline.

Soon after, she received a letter from her brother Edward. He first expressed his condolences _for the barbarous, horrific murder_ of her husband. He then congratulated her on the safe delivery of her son Percy, and inquired her regarding little John’s well-being. Finally, he filled her in on the details of his life for the past decade. 

Just as she had married John and relocated to India, Edward had, on a whim, boarded a ship captained by a Dutch acquaintance. The ship was bound for the New World - specifically, the settlement of Demerara in the Dutch colony of Guyana. Because their parents had not approved of his parting, Edward, having no financial support, indentured himself to a Dutch tobacco farmer named Geert Westraete.

After several years of heavy labor, Edward’s employer made him his majordomo, and put him in charge of his domestic affairs. Now, one year hence, his period of indentured servitude was over. He had chosen to stay on at the Westraete plantation. Having been informed of Katherine’s widowhood and hardships, Mr. Westraete now wished to extend her an invitation to accept room and board at the plantation, in exchange for performing housekeeping duties.

Guyana. The place sounded exotic, and Edward’s descriptions made Katherine feel such a surge of longing that she felt short of breath. As little John slept on a quilt on the floor of the dilapidated bungalow, whilst Percy nursed quietly at her breast, Katherine made her decision.

_Please tell Mr. Westraete I gladly accept. We should arrive in Demerara by the New Year._


	6. Chapter 6

True to her word, Katherine and her children arrived in Demerara before the New Year. The ship docked in the harbor on 29 December, and Katherine was delighted to see Edward waiting for them at the quayside. 

When she saw her beloved brother after an absence of nearly ten years, Katherine wanted to run to him and embrace him. But, as that would be unseemly for a woman of her station, she made do with a smile and light kiss to both of his cheeks, which he returned, in the French fashion.

Edward beamed when he saw Percy, asleep in his sister’s arms. At three months old, the baby strongly resembled Katherine, sharing her dark auburn hair and heart-shaped face. He wondered if the baby also shared her blue eyes. As Percy slept on, Edward took notice of his other nephew, standing a distance behind them, watching impassively.

Katherine glanced over her shoulder, frowning to see John’s brow furrow in a sullen expression. _John,_ she chided, _say hello to your uncle Edward._

 _Hello, sir._ John shuffled forward and reluctantly extended his hand. Edward repressed an amused grin and took the small boy’s hand. _Hello, John. It is very nice to meet you. I hope you will be happy here._

The Westraete plantation was massive, taking up nearly ⅛ of the settlement. Tobacco was the main crop, but beginning that year sugarcane was harvested as well. Geert Westraete was a fat, squat man with a disheveled appearance and a penchant for wearing black.

He owned a dozen or so West African slaves, and had about a dozen more indentured servants, all of them Dutch. Besides Katherine and Edward, there were no other English workers on the plantation. Westraete agreed to house the Simcoes in a guest room, until Percy was weaned; after that time, they would be moved a one-room shack like those inhabited by the other slaves and servants. It would not do to show them favoritism, simply because they were Edward’s kin.

The three months that the Simcoes lived in the mansion were largely uneventful. Katherine was somewhat disappointed to see that John was uninterested in the finery around him. He passed his days with Addie, a house slave of about 20. Addie looked after John while Katherine cared for Percy, and went about her own work.

There was no shortage of sewing, darning, or ironing to be done. Addie - the shortened form of her true, Yoruba name _Adebowale_ , which no one could pronounce - spent most of her days in the massive kitchen, preparing meals for _Meester Westraete_ , Edward Graves, and now for his sister and nephews.

John, unaccustomed to being in the periphery of his mother’s concerns, sat on a stool in the corner of the kitchen. Addie chattered to him in her refreshingly crisp, cultured English. She told him of her birth to an English merchant and his slave, a Yoruba woman who had been captured and sold to him by the Asante. She did not resent her life as a slave, she said, because she had never known any other life. 

Her father had never publicly acknowledged her, but he had done what he could to improve her lot in life. When she was five years old, she was separated from her mother - a field slave - and trained in how to run the kitchen. From that day, she was permitted to speak only English - if she was heard speaking Yoruba, she was beaten.

She learned to equate her mother tongue with pain. She absorbed English the way a sponge did water. Her father’s language - which, compared with the musical lilt of Yoruba, seemed guttural and savage - became her anchor. Even her Yoruba name became unacceptable, so her father renamed her.

It was the name she asked little John to call her. He had been at the plantation for a fortnight, and still had not spoken a word to her. Maybe he thought he was better than her, or maybe he just had nothing to say. 

The day he finally did speak to her, she had done nothing in particular to try to persuade him; she believed the child should be left to his own devices. When he wanted to speak, he would, and in the meantime, he was still pleasant company.

When one night he timidly bid her _goodnight, Addie,_ her eyes blurred with tears as she returned the sentiment. He nodded, and the corners of his mouth slowly turned up in a small, faltering smile. As he left the room, Addie found herself praying - something she had not done in so long she was ashamed.

She prayed the _Meester_ would be kind to the boy and to his family. At the most basic level, John Graves Simcoe was not so different from her: an innocent, exiled child who had lost everything he had ever known, wholly dependent on the whims of cruel men who would regard him only as burdensome chattel.


	7. Chapter 7

All of Addie’s prayers did nothing. _Meester_ Westraete moved little John into a cabin in the slaves’ quarters and kept Katherine and Percy in the main house. Katherine had initially cried and appealed to Edward for help, but his response had been to sigh and shake his head.

It was not his place to get involved in his employer’s private matters. Katherine replied by spitting in his face. What sort of matters would he involve himself in, when he refused to take up for his own nephew? Edward retorted that if she was so disturbed by the situation, she could pack her things and leave.

Penniless, unable to speak Dutch, and deeply indebted to her brother’s employer, Katherine knew that she had no choice but to stay. So, when Percy was weaned in the spring of 1757, she submitted to Westraete’s demands that she become his mistress. Percy was allowed to stay with her, because babies needed their mothers, after all.

John, on the other hand, was a self-sufficient child, if willful and ungrateful. His future would be one of penury and servitude, so why should he expect to be treated any differently now? As much as she hated to, Katherine understood this reasoning.

At five years old, John began to live the life of an indentured servant. He helped Addie to set table and to clean up after meals. He served his mother and his baby brother, who was too young to know what was going on.

For years, Katherine observed as John was alternately praised and pampered by Addie, while being berated and beaten by Westraete. He was coldly ignored by his uncle Edward and eventually - though she hated to admit it - by Katherine herself.

By the time he was nine years old, John no longer regarded Katherine as his mother. It was Addie who made sure he had enough to eat, who clothed him with the discarded rags passed down from other child slaves. Percy, at four, spoke Dutch as his first language, and was being schooled in Westraete’s Reformed faith.

Though Katherine’s service contract ended in 1761, she was aware of Westraete’s expectation that she would marry him and assume her position as matriarch of the plantation. He had made no secret of his disappointment that Katherine had not conceived in the many years of their _arrangement_. It seemed that Katherine had become barren, so Westraete began to consider adopting Percy.

When her contract ended in December of that year, Katherine and Westraete were married in a civil ceremony by the local magistrate. Within the hour, Westraete formally adopted Percy as his own son.


	8. Chapter 8

John became fascinated by moments of suffering. He watched, transfixed, as errant slaves and servants were beaten. His eyes widened as their skin broke open under the strokes of the cat o’ nine tails. The sounds of their cries of pain excited him, almost seemed to energize him.

In the house, when Addie did not see, he began to beat the slaves, with increasing ferocity. If anyone gave him even the semblance of an attitude or disobedience, John would hit them, splitting lips, leaving contusions, and otherwise maiming with his bare fists.

One day, he beat a boy so badly that blood spattered the walls. He got in trouble with Addie, who slapped him and left the bright red imprint of her hand on the pale flesh of his cheek. Addie thought she had been wrong about him, thought that he was a sweet, loving boy - but now she saw that he was as bloodthirsty and merciless as all the other white men she had known.

Addie’s words stung, but John found that he was no longer able to suppress his sadistic compulsions. At eleven, he quit being a house servant, and attached himself to the head overseer, a hard-drinking, hard-hitting Welshman named Myrick. Under his tutelage, John became a seasoned tormentor, daily splitting open the backs and buttocks of slaves and indentured servants who were guilty of some infraction.

If a servant spilt food or water, they received 10 lashes. If they overslept, the punishment was 15 lashes. The punishments gradually became more severe in what was considered proportional to the transgressions committed. Insubordination, the most serious offense, was punished by 40 lashes.

As his power and addiction to violence grew, John almost forgot that he too was subject to the same rules as the other servants and slaves. On the occasion of his 12th birthday, John did something that was entirely uncharacteristic. When the bell rang at 4:30 in the morning for the work day to begin, he stayed in bed.

Addie came and tried to wake him, but he was as immovable as a stone. Fearing the consequences if she herself should be late, she reluctantly left John to begin her own duties. John was awakened violently, by the sickening _thwack!_ of a whip cutting into the flesh of his side.

John leapt up with a sob, clutching his injured side as blood blossomed beneath his white sleeping gown. He glared balefully at Myrick, who in turn regarded the boy with a hard, flinty grimace.

_That’s it, boy!_ Myrick growled. He reached over with a brawny hand, grabbed John by the collar of his nightshirt, and dragged him sobbing and pleading for mercy out of the cabin.


	9. Chapter 9

John woke to find himself tightly bound to the whipping post in the middle of the courtyard. The fear and stress he had experienced being dragged out of bed had made him lose consciousness. He lifted his gaze and turned his head to see a crowd of people staring at him. He was too tightly bound to turn and look behind, but he knew from the vehement whispers that he was surrounded.

He could not discern what anyone was saying. The whispers ceased when his stepfather began to speak. In a cold, bored tone, Westraete declared that he had deliberately shirked his morning duties, an effect which had caused the other slaves to become lethargic in theirs. The punishment for his idleness would be 15 lashes.

John heard several of the spectators gasp. Some cursed, and a few even laughed. John did not blame them. He had brutalized virtually every servant on the plantation, except for Addie.

Her voice rose above all the others, loudly pleading for mercy. She attempted to appeal to his vanity, reminding him of his status as one of the most prominent figures in the settlement - in the country. Little John was only a child, she protested, and, in some ways, his own son. Showing mercy would not only endear him to his slaves, but would also heighten his esteem in the minds of his peers.

Westraete seemed to consider this for all of one minute, before signalling Myrick to begin. John’s mentor and compatriot in cruelty brought raised the cat o’ nine tails and brought the whip crashing down on the bared skin of his back. The pain was intense, unlike anything John had ever felt. Hot and searing, it seemed like a living creature as it tore through his nerve endings.

He cried out, but when the others began to jeer and mock, John steeled himself. As Myrick continued to flog him, he lowered his head, closed his eyes, and gritted his teeth. After the fifth blow, he could no longer feel anything.

That was merciful, at least. Unconscious, John could no longer hear Addie’s agonized screams, nor the sickening cackles of the crowd. 

Most mercifully of all, he could not discern the most disturbing sound - or rather, the _lack_ of sound: the absence of his mother’s voice among the fray.


	10. Chapter 10

John woke to find himself tightly bound to the whipping post in the middle of the courtyard. The fear and stress he had experienced being dragged out of bed had made him lose consciousness. He lifted his gaze and turned his head to see a crowd of people staring at him. He was too tightly bound to turn and look behind, but he knew from the vehement whispers that he was surrounded.

He could not discern what anyone was saying. The whispers ceased when his stepfather began to speak. In a cold, bored tone, Westraete declared that he had deliberately shirked his morning duties, an effect which had caused the other slaves to become lethargic in theirs. The punishment for his idleness would be 15 lashes.

John heard several of the spectators gasp. Some cursed, and a few even laughed. John did not blame them. He had brutalized virtually every servant on the plantation, except for Addie.

Her voice rose above all the others, loudly pleading for mercy. She attempted to appeal to his vanity, reminding him of his status as one of the most prominent figures in the settlement - in the country. Little John was only a child, she protested, and, in some ways, his own son. Showing mercy would not only endear him to his slaves, but would also heighten his esteem in the minds of his peers.

Westraete seemed to consider this for all of one minute, before signalling Myrick to begin. John’s mentor and compatriot in cruelty brought raised the cat o’ nine tails and brought the whip crashing down on the bared skin of his back. The pain was intense, unlike anything John had ever felt. Hot and searing, it seemed like a living creature as it tore through his nerve endings.

He cried out, but when the others began to jeer and mock, John steeled himself. As Myrick continued to flog him, he lowered his head, closed his eyes, and gritted his teeth. After the fifth blow, he could no longer feel anything.

That was merciful, at least. Unconscious, John could no longer hear Addie’s agonized screams, nor the sickening cackles of the crowd.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Addie covered John’s back with linen strips soaked in oregano oil. For all the screaming she had done during the beating, she was now speechless. She said nothing, but John felt the wetness of her tears soak the linen, mingling with the oil. He was confined to his bed, lying on his stomach, for the rest of the week.

When he was strong enough to return to work, he was assigned to domestic cleaning duties. He alone was tasked with the upkeep of the three dozen rooms in the mansion. If he failed to get every room cleaned on time, or if his efforts did not meet the standards set by _Meester_ Westraete, he was beaten.

He was beaten most often with fists, but occasionally with the stinging medal of a soup ladle. He had been beaten for most of his life, so that was not unusual. What was unusual was that he was now beaten in full view of others, namely, his mother and little brother.

If he had ever entertained the hope that one day Katherine would intervene on his behalf, it was quickly dashed as he watched her observe his chastisement with an expression of blank boredom as he was routinely abused. John was regularly punished by the very servants he used to punish. Katherine held 7-year-old Percy upon her lap, absently running her fingers through his hair - the same red-brown shade as John's - as the little brat smugly glowered at him. 

After several months of such treatment, when bitter hatred had grown to such an extent in John's heart he thought it would burst, he was given an unexpected task. Because Percy's nursemaid was ill, John was instructed to oversee Percy's bath. The procedure itself was simple enough. After boiling a pot of water over the fire, he carried it into the small washroom attached to Percy's nursery. The tub was small and made of copper. John filled the tub with boiling water from the pot ten times before it was filled.

Percy undressed and got in the tub, carelessly throwing his clothes in a pile.

In keeping with his servile standing, John neatly folded the silk shirt and breeches. He thought the clothes were too fine for a boy. He thought he almost remembered the feel of the silk of his baptismal gown. He thought too of his - their - brothers. Paul and William would be 19 and 18 years old now, respectively. Paul would in all likelihood have taken over their father's post at Fort William; William would have been a soldier in the Royal Army.

As third son, John should be enrolled in an apprenticeship with a tradesman, preparing for his confirmation in the Church of England. Besides the reading of Scripture by the chaplain and the occasional hymns sung by Addie, John had no exposure to matters related to God or religion. 

John reached out for Percy and placed his hands on his shoulders. He knew what he was going to do, even as the boy smiled at him. John felt a bittersweet mixture of horror and satisfaction as he pushed Percy down until his head was under the water. He held him down as the boy began to struggle, and stared intently into Percy's eyes until the pupils began to dilate.


End file.
